Ring of Fire IV

by Eric Flint

  “I am Archidiakon Simon Schönfeldt of Heilige Geist Church, Herr Röloffse,” he said. “They are here with the knowledge of the church.”

  “Hmmph.” The old man still looked skeptical. “I guess you’d be wanting me to show you which room is his, then.”

  “If you would,” Gotthilf said.

  “Clear the way, then.”

  Everyone in the hall stepped to one side or the other and opened a path for Röloffse. He strode through and led them back down the hall to where a flight of stairs led upward.

  They mounted to the third floor, then followed the old man back down the hall toward the rear of the building. Gotthilf was glad that no one was opening doors and sticking heads out. Their little processional would have occasioned comments and discussions that he would just as soon not have to deal with at that moment.

  Röloffse stopped at a door. “Here,” he said.

  Byron first knocked at the door. No response. Knocked again. Still no response. He tried the door. It was locked. He looked at the old man.

  “Got a key?”

  A hint of a smirk crossed Röloffse’s face. “Yah. We own the locks on the doors.”

  Byron stepped back and motioned to the door. The old man detached a large ring of keys from his belt and held it up before his face in the light from the window at the end of the hall. Gotthilf was surprised at the nimbleness of the fingers in Röloffse’s one hand as he rolled keys around the ring, counting, “…fifteen, sixteen, seventeen, and eighteen. Here we are.”

  Röloffse applied the key to the lock in the door and turned it. The click of the lock mechanism turning was loud in the hallway. He removed the key and tripped the latch so that the door stood slightly ajar. Stepping back with a broader smirk, he waved at the open door.

  “Thanks,” Byron said brusquely. “We’ll take it from here.” He waited for the old man to head for the stairs, then turned to the patrolmen. “Any of you have gloves?”

  Kierstede pulled a pair out of his jacket. The other two just shook their heads.

  “Right. You two stand out here and guard the room,” Byron directed. He motioned with his head, and Gotthilf and the rest followed him into the room.

  “Gloves,” Byron said.

  Gotthilf looked at Schönfeldt as he pulled his own gloves on. “Pastor, you stand there by the door and watch. Do not touch anything unless we tell you to.”

  Schönfeldt nodded.

  Gotthilf and Byron looked at Kierstede. Byron motioned to Gotthilf, then started looking around on his own.

  “Touch things only if you have to,” Gotthilf instructed the patrolman. “Be careful about how you move things. Look everywhere you can, every place there is to look.” With that they joined the lieutenant in the search.

  Agricola’s residence was a suite of two rooms. One was a sitting room with a sofa and chairs clustered around a small table and a desk and chair shoved up against a wall on the far side of the room. The other was a small bedroom, from what Gotthilf could tell looking through the door.

  There was a mound of books piled on the desk. Gotthilf began there, picking them up one at a time and leafing through the pages with care. Somewhere around the third book he saw out of the corner of his eye that Kierstede headed into the bedroom. An aimless whistling began sounding from in there as Gotthilf continued to page through the books.

  He was in the middle of the eighth book when Kierstede called out, “I think I’ve found some-urk!”

  There was a clatter from the bedroom and the patrolman rushed through the sitting room with his hand clamped over his mouth. As the sounds of explosive vomiting echoed in the hall, Gotthilf dropped the book and beat Byron through the door to the bedroom by a split-second.

  There they found a small wooden box lying on the bed with its lid beside it. In the box were several small jars. Gotthilf picked one up.

  “Scheisse!” He recoiled in horror, his own gorge rising.

  In his shaking hand was a small clear glass jar filled with a clear liquid. Floating in the liquid, almost as if they were peering at him, were a pair of blue eyes. He managed to set the jar down without dropping it, then backed up a step, hands fisted at his sides.

  Byron didn’t say anything, but Gotthilf could see his jaw muscles bunched up; always a sign of anger in his partner. The up-timer picked up the other jars in the box. Two of them were also filled with the same clear liquid as the first, and pairs of blue eyes floated in them as well. The third was empty.

  Each of the three jars Byron held was set down by the up-timer with care beside the one that Gotthilf had pulled out of the box. Then Byron took a deep breath, held it for a long moment, and released it in a controlled manner.

  “Archidiakon Schönfeldt,” the up-timer called out, “would you come here, please?” Gotthilf remarked at how calm his voice seemed.

  Schönfeldt appeared in the doorway. Byron beckoned him forward. “I think we have found our evidence, sir, to arrest Pastor Agricola for premeditated murder. What do you think?”

  Gotthilf saw an expression of pure horror come across the pastor’s face. “O merciful God in heaven,” the man whispered, hand flying to his mouth. After a long moment, his face set in a rigid expression. He lowered his hand and looked at the detectives. “Arrest him,” the pastor said, “and make your case in court. If he is convicted, there will be no outcry from the church.”

  “Byron,” Gotthilf said.

  “What?”

  “Agricola’s killed three times,” Gotthilf pointed out, “but there’s a fourth jar there. We need to find him now.”

  Byron’s head swiveled to focus on Schönfeldt’s face. “Where is he going to be at this moment?”

  Schönfeldt pulled out a pocket watch. “He should be at St. Jacob’s church, close to finishing the evening service.”

  Byron grabbed the pastor by the arm. “Come on! Gotthilf, seal the room!” he threw over his shoulder as he pulled Schönfeldt through the bedroom doorway and toward the hall.

  Gotthilf followed them, stopping long enough to close the door to Agricola’s rooms. He looked at the two guards. “You two will stand guard over this room until the coroner arrives. No one enters until then. No one. I don’t care if Emperor Gustav Adolf shows up, he doesn’t get in. Got it?”

  “Got it, Sergeant,” one of them answered. “But do we have to stand here smelling his puke?”

  “Until someone comes to clean it up, yes,” Gotthilf responded as he grabbed a white-faced Kierstede by the arm and pulled him along toward the stairs.

  “You owe us, Kierstede!” sounded from behind them. The patrolman waved a shaky hand in acknowledgment as he started down the stairs.

  Gotthilf clattered down the stairs as quickly as he could, towing Kierstede in his wake. He arrived at the ground floor almost under the nose of Röloffse, who stepped back in surprise.

  “There’s been an accident in the hallway up there,” Gotthilf said as he trotted by the old man. “You might send someone up to clean it up.”

  They burst out the front door and hurried to where Byron and the pastor were already in the wagon. Gotthilf boosted Kierstede into the wagon, then grabbed Byron’s outstretched hand and was yanked up by main force.

  “Go!” Byron ordered, and the driver popped his horse into a reckless trot.

  The day was becoming twilight, and curses followed them as people had to dodge the wagon. Gotthilf heard something over the rumble of the wheels. Archidiakon Schönfeldt was talking aloud. For a moment, Gotthilf couldn’t understand it, then it registered with him that the pastor was speaking in Latin.

  Requiem Aeternam dona eis,

  Domine,

  Et lux perpetuae luceat eis.

  Requiescant in pace.

  Amen.

  It was the prayer for the dead from the Requiem Mass. As Schönfeldt finished with the Amen, he would start over again at Requiem. Gotthilf looked away from him. The man had just received a serious shock, and if this helped him cope with it, that was okay
with Gotthilf. And in the back of his mind he figured that any prayers to God were a good thing, particularly at this point in time.

  The wagon rumbled over the bridge into the old city, pedestrians scattering like birds. Gotthilf reached across and grabbed Kierstede. “When we stop rolling,” he shouted, “you get two blocks away from the church and blow your whistle for a patrol sergeant. When he shows up, you tell him I said we need the coroner at the rooming house we just left, on the third floor. If he thinks you need to go along with the message, you do that, otherwise you run back to the church and find us. Got that?”

  Kierstede gave a firm nod. His color was back to normal, so Gotthilf thought he could handle that assignment. He looked to Byron, who nodded but said nothing.

  Despite the horse’s quick trot, it was still another minute or so before they arrived at the church. As soon as the driver pulled the horse up short and the wheels stilled, Kierstede was off the back of the wagon and hurtling away from the church in pursuit of his orders.

  Gotthilf and Byron jumped down from the wagon; Archidiakon Schönfeldt followed at a bit more deliberate pace, but still wasted no time. They faced a very small group of parishioners exiting the church in the deepening twilight.

  “Small crowd,” Byron remarked.

  “It is a sad but unremarkable fact that a weekday evening service never attracts many attenders even in the larger churches,” Schönfeldt replied in a quiet voice, searching the crowd as much as the detectives were. “Most attend only on Sunday.” He stiffened. “There he is.”

  Gotthilf followed the pastor’s gaze and saw Agricola emerging from the church talking to a youngish woman.

  “All right,” Byron murmured, “let’s approach him quietly and ask him to come with us to answer some questions. Archidiakon, you stand here.”

  Byron stepped out and Gotthilf followed his lead. They approached the man that Gotthilf could only think of as “the perp” with ease. Although Gotthilf’s hand itched to be holding the .32 caliber revolver that was sitting in his shoulder holster under his jacket, he made it swing freely at his side, and concentrated on keeping a pleasant expression on his face rather than the anger and loathing he felt inside.

  “Pastor Agricola?” Byron called out as they neared the man.

  “Yes?” Agricola was more nasal than Gotthilf recalled it. The pastor turned slightly so he could see them without losing sight of the woman he was speaking with.

  “Lieutenant Chieske of the Magdeburg Polizei,” Byron replied. “I believe you’ve already met my partner, Sergeant Hoch.”

  Gotthilf kept the pleasant expression on his face by slipping by main force of will.

  “Do you need something, Lieutenant?” Agricola made it clear by tone and expression that he felt he had better things to do than speak with the police at that moment.

  “We would appreciate it if you would come down to the station and talk to us,” Gotthilf said. “We have some questions about a case we’re investigating that we think you could help us with.” Gotthilf was proud of how casual he sounded.

  “I think not,” Agricola responded tartly as he turned back to the young woman.

  “I’m afraid we must insist,” Byron said in a cooler tone as he took a step closer. Gotthilf sidled to the right to put a slight separation between himself and his partner. It was taking more self-control to keep his hand off of his pistol.

  The young woman standing by Agricola said, “No need to see me home, Pastor. I can make my way alone.”

  She started to step away. Agricola’s left hand snaked out to grasp her arm. “No! Don’t leave.”

  At that, Gotthilf’s right hand moved inside his jacket to rest on the butt of his revolver. He could see from the corner of his eye that Byron’s right hand was behind his back and under his jacket, obviously grasping the up-time Colt automatic he carried there. Neither one of them moved.

  “Go away! Leave!” Agricola shouted at them. “I have nothing to do with you. I know who you are, men whose hands are bloody with the lives of those you have brought down.”

  Byron snorted. “Bit of the pot and the kettle there, I think.” Agricola’s brows lowered in confusion. The up-timer straightened, although his hand remained behind his back. “Timotheus Agricola, I arrest you on the charge of premeditated murder. Let her go and come with us.”

  Agricola shook his head sharply. “No!” he said, “No! You cannot do this to me. I am a pastor, a man of God, doing God’s work and God’s will. You have no cause and no right to do this. Go away!”

  Byron took a step closer, angled away from Gotthilf. Gotthilf stepped once in a similar manner as he said, “Herr Agricola, you are under arrest for the murders of Margrethe Döhren, Anna Seyfart, and Justina Hösch.”

  The young woman’s eyes had opened wide in panic, and she was trying to get free from Agricola’s grasp. Although he looked to be scrawny, he must have had a fierce grip, as her struggles were in vain.

  “You don’t understand,” Agricola’s nasal tone intensified. His eyes flicked back and forth between the two detectives. “I have done nothing wrong.”

  “You shall not murder,” Byron said. “Exodus chapter 20.”

  Agricola’s face twisted. There was a flurry of movement as his right hand reached over and pulled the woman in front of him. His left arm looped around her neck almost in a choke hold, and his right hand dropped into a side coat pocket and pulled out something metallic which he raised against her neck.

  “Knife!” Gotthilf called out as he took two steps to his right. His pistol was out but hung at his side. He couldn’t take a shot. Not yet. Too much risk of hitting the woman.

  “Get back!” Agricola ordered in a strained voice. “Don’t move!”

  Byron raised his left hand and made a calming gesture. “Herr Agricola, just calm down. We don’t want anyone to get hurt here.”

  “You will address me as Pastor!” Agricola shouted. “I am a man of God!”

  “Fine, Pastor Agricola, fine,” Byron said. “We’ll call you that. But calm down, and let’s not hurt anyone.”

  Gotthilf saw Agricola’s gaze shift past him, then he felt more than saw Archidiakon Schönfeldt step up beside him. “Timotheus,” the pastor said in a calm voice.

  Agricola seemed to settle a bit. “Simon,” he responded.

  “I have seen the Bible with the cut pages,” Schönfeldt continued in that calm voice. “I have seen the eyes in your rooms.” There was a long silence during which Agricola seemed to shrink a bit. “Timotheus…why?”

  For a moment, it seemed as if Agricola’s arms were going to drop. Gotthilf tensed to spring forward, but then Agricola tightened and his eyes seem to light up.

  “Are you against me, too, Simon?”

  Schönfeldt spread his hands, and repeated, “Why, Timotheus?”

  Agricola hesitated for a breath, two, then said in a very low voice, “I have the French disease.”

  Gotthilf saw Byron mouth “Syphilis,” and nod.

  It was called variously the French disease, the English disease, or the Spanish or Spaniard’s disease depending on where you might be in Europe. But regardless of the name, syphilis was still as nasty a venereal disease in the 1630s as it was in the future that Grantville came from.

  “Oh, Timotheus,” Schönfeldt muttered.

  “I was young,” Agricola said, “barely nineteen when I met her. I was studying medicine at the university in Leipzig. I’d never lain with a woman before, but when I met Annalise in a tavern that night, I was captivated by her. She had the bluest eyes, and they ensorcelled me. I spent my money on her, and she took me to her bed. Twice only, I swear it. But when I ran out of money and was reduced to stealing bread from my friends to survive, she moved on.

  “When it became clear that Annalise had left me a gift to remember her by, I went looking for her. I don’t know what I would have done if I’d found her then, but she was gone. No one in Leipzig knew where she went. And when I let slip to one tavern maid why I was lo
oking for her, she laughed a cruel laugh and said that she had done likewise to half the men in town.”

  Schönfeldt shook his head in sorrow.

  “I began to study religion in penance for my sins,” Agricola continued, a distant expression on his face, “and I distanced myself from women. For years I found comfort in serving God. But then, one day I saw her eyes, staring at me. Those blue eyes, laughing at me, teasing me, taunting me, telling me my faith was weak and worthless.”

  There was a moment of silence.

  “What did you do?” Schönfeldt finally asked.

  “It was obvious to me that Annalise had been a succubus,” Agricola responded in a voice of reason. “And now she was inhabiting a new vessel. But she didn’t recognize me, so I was able to get her alone. When I commanded her in the name of Christ to come out, she did not do so. So I silenced her. And then I removed her from her vessel.”

  Gotthilf felt nausea listening to this account from what was becoming more apparent by the moment to be a very deranged man.

  “And then?” Schönfeldt prompted.

  “Then I saw her again. And again I removed her from her vessel.”

  “How many times now?” Schönfeldt asked.

  “Three,” Agricola responded.

  “And have you seen her since then?”

  “Yes.”

  Gotthilf shivered. No telling how many times this lunatic would have killed if they hadn’t found him today.

  “Timotheus,” Schönfeldt said, “is Annalise in the woman you are holding?”

  “No,” came the drawn-out reply.

  “You need to release her.”

  “No. I need her.”

  “Why?” Schönfeldt replied.

  Gotthilf’s attention was attracted by movement behind Agricola. Someone had appeared in the doorway behind the pastor and his hostage, someone who was moving very carefully and very quietly up behind them, taking care to remain in Agricola’s blind spot. Gotthilf kept his eyes focused on Agricola’s face, letting his peripheral vision see the moving figure. He tensed, and rocked forward onto his toes.